


girl with the cinderblock garden

by adverbialstarlight



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/F, First Meetings, Foster Care, Friendship, Pre-Relationship, Teen Angst, i honestly dont know how to tag this, so like mostly friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-21
Updated: 2019-01-21
Packaged: 2019-10-13 21:47:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,751
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17495981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/adverbialstarlight/pseuds/adverbialstarlight
Summary: Catra is not the type to make friends easily. It isn't really easy to, being in the foster system and overall not very sociable and all. But when she meets a girl with bright blonde hair and attentive eyes in the back of a church during one of many motivational pep talk seminars for foster and adopted teens, that might just change.





	girl with the cinderblock garden

**Author's Note:**

> hi disclaimer, though i myself have been to quite a few Motivational Speaker Seminars For Adopted And Foster KidsTM dont rely too heavily on this for seeing how they are?? the last one i went to was like 5 years ago and this idea was spontaneous
> 
> unedited/betaed please excuse any mistakes. title from cinderblock garden because idk ask the brain its literally 3 am as im posting this

Friendship was not simple for Catra. It didn’t begin with a smile or a fruit snack or an empty seat on the school bus. It didn’t last a decade and fill her with a feeling of security and trust. Friendship for her was several people passing through her life quickly—only there for as long as Catra was of use or until they decided she was a bitch or until Catra was transferred out of the school, never caring as much about her as she did them. She was just another stepping stone in the grand scheme of their life, a foil to their success and a sob story to try and fix. It came to a point where she didn’t even try anymore, there was no point when they were all just going to leave anyway.

She’d hardened to the fact over the years, having no other choice when it happened so damn often, but there was one friend, one of the first that had never entirely scarred over. It was tenth grade and they were in the further back pews of some sort of church. There was some guy in the front giving a presentation on perseverance or hope or something equally stupid, talking at a group of twenty or so bored foster kids. Most were from the same agency, owned by a pompous woman they called Shadow Weaver. There were a few recent adoptees as well, though there were probably only one or two total people actually listening to what the man was saying.

They’d all heard it before, the same Hallmark encouragements and stories of success and overcoming, if Shadow Weaver asked them afterwards what he’d been lecturing on Catra would probably be able to summarize it despite not hearing a word of it. The dude had been abused or his parents died or something and so he was entered into the foster system. He was depressed, ADHD, and was an angsty teenager who wanted to die, someone just like them. And then he found _the_ family and his life was completely transformed so now he did some weird freelance job and went around talking to foster kids to enlighten them or something. It was nothing new.

Catra was kicking her feet and spinning the ring on her finger, fighting the urge to glance at the clock again or jump up from her seat. These things went on for nearly an hour, the doors locked and the lecture incessant—in other words, absolute hell. She huffed loudly again, causing the girl next to her to look up. When they’d sat down she looked kind of interesting, like someone that might help tame Catra’s boredom during this whole thing. But instead she was nodding along and listening to lecture, eyes never leaving the speaker, and Catra was thoroughly disappointed.

“You good?” the girl whispered, tilting her head in concern and causing a strand of blonde hair to slip from behind her ear. Alright, she was _that_ kind then.

Catra shrugged, staring up at the ceiling. This place really was kind of pretty, with intricate stained glass and tall open windows with the stone around them carved into smooth curls and frills. The only thing that’d make it even better was if the crucifix with Jesus would stop staring at her as if he knew that she was thinking about saying a swear word. “I’ve heard this speech like a million times in a million different versions,” she replied, propping her feet onto the small pocket for the hymn book and bible.

The girl nodded sympathetically. “Yeah same, but they’re still kind of interesting, you know? It’s nearly the exact same story each time, yeah, but the way they tell it is always different. There’s smaller details that really make you think about the factors that landed us where we are. Going to these things still sucks, yeah, but it could be worse.” When Catra said nothing, the girl turned to her again and smiled. “I’m Adora, by the way. Nice to meet you!”

Catra nodded and looked curiously at the hand Adora held out. Though she definitely seemed like the kind of person to shake someone’s hand when they first met no matter the setting— her point currently being proved as correct— Catra didn’t actually believe it would happen. Touching her was out of pure necessity for most, it was unusual for someone to want to shake her hand without having to be prompted to. She hid her moment of surprise and hesitation with and snort and crossed her arms, nodding. “Catra,” she replied.

“Cool, nice to meet you, Catra,” Adora said, nodding. It was an odd sight, it was like she really _did_ think it was nice to meet her. Catra wasn’t one for self pity, but this wasn’t something that usually happened. Something warm fluttered in her chest. She tried to stomp it out immediately. Developing spontaneous crushes on random girls that she’d never see again was dumb, she would _not_ do that again. Adora glanced up to the front where the speaker had yet to even change the slide and sighed. “You know, I love these things but I’ve got to agree with you on this one, I can’t stand this guy,” she continued quietly.

Catra held back a snort and shrugged. “Yeah,” she said. And then, after a long moment, “I’m getting out of here, you wanna come with me?”

She wasn’t sure why she did it. Perhaps this seminar was numbing her ability to make rational decisions— something that wasn’t very strong to begin with but nonetheless seemed weaker now. Perhaps she had gotten the flu and wasn’t actually at this seminar but back at the home and having some sort of weird fever dream. It had to be _something_ , but what Catra didn’t know. She wouldn’t dwell on it though, and instead braced herself for Adora’s answer. She wasn’t sure what exactly they would do if Adora said yes, but Catra _really_ wanted her to.

After a moment of contemplation— the silence filled by the speaker praising having a positive growth mindset no matter what, something Catra couldn’t resist snorting at— Adora finally nodded, a small smile forming on her lips. “Sure, why not,” she said. “I guess we _have_ heard this before.”

Catra didn’t even check to see if their chaperones were distracted before she pulled Adora up by the wrist and practically dragged Adora through the doors. They didn’t stop until they reached the door, where Catra stopped to hold it open for Adora. The other girl giggled and thanked her, and then they were racing through the parking lot and towards the playground on the other side. There was apparently an elementary school around here that used this, but they all must have been in class now because it was completely empty.

Trudging through the pebbles, the two girls approached the jungle gym on the far side of the playground. It faced towards the still snowy mountains, clear of the fog and rainclouds that were present earlier. Perhaps she was a sap who loved the mountains, but perhaps it was fate.

Catra scaled the structure easily despite the drops of rain still sticking to the metal, glancing bellow to see Adora doing the same. The other girl looked excited, as if she’d never snuck out of a seminar before to sit on a rusty jungle gym. Catra felt an inexplicable surge of pride to be the one that helped her finally live a little beyond pep talks about having faith in your foster parents and social worker.

She shifted over, hooking her legs around the bar below her and dropped down, grinning at Adora upside down. Adora shrieked, moving a bit in the other direction to stare at Catra. She clutched a hand to her heart with wide eyes. “Jesus Christ, Catra,” she exclaimed. “This thing is soaking wet I thought you were going to fall off this thing and crack your skull open!”

Catra waved a finger at her and grinned. It was kind of nice to have a stranger worry about her like this. Like she was worth something beyond a bad mark on someone’s record if she _did_ crack her skull open up here. Like Adora was concerned for her, as a person and almost even as a friend. “Don’t use his name in vain,” Catra replied. “We’re still on church property, you know.”

Adora rolled her eyes but moved her hand to rest by Catra’s foot, glancing out towards the mountains. “You know I’ve never actually been far enough out from the middle of the city to actually see these things,” she said contemplatively.

Catra pulled herself back up to sit comfortably next to Adora, studying the other girl’s face. “Eh,” she said, shrugging. “Most of the time you can’t even see them over here, it’s always snowing or raining by those ones.”

“Still,” Adora insisted. “They’re pretty. And they’re always there, even if you can’t actually see them. They’re consistent, you know that they’ll stay there and not just… leave overnight or something. Like a family member, or a friend or something, y’know?”

She glanced over at Catra again, who quickly averted her eyes and began picking at one of her nails. It’d probably be smart to cut them again, she thought, and maybe paint them again. Perhaps blue. Blue like the color of the clearing afternoon sky, blue like Adora’s bright eyes, shining with enthusiasm and currently focused on Catra.

Catra shrugged again, trying her best to remain casual. “Wouldn’t really know. I obviously don’t exactly have a family and friends have never really been my thing. I just kinda… exist around here.”

A pause, and then, “Well, then I can be your friend.”

Catra looked up to see a determined gleam in Adora’s eyes and a soft smile on her lips. Her offer was sincere, somehow, not just the empty pitying reply of a kind, charitable person. Usually Catra would have scoffed, told her that she could do fine without, thank you very much, but there was something in the back of her mind telling her to say yes. That _yes_ , this time it was going to be different, that this time something could come of it and that Adora might stick with her no matter how difficult things might get— that this decision could change her life.

And so Catra found herself nodding, smiling back, and saying, “Yeah, I’d like that.”

**Author's Note:**

> ok ngl this has been a wip for like a month and i pulled it out again yesterday so i could use it to apply for a she ra zine. it was originally for klance bc i had suddenly remembered these weird seminar things one day but i decided yo catradora fits better so yeah here we are. also to be fair not all of these are entirely bad i just had better things to do with my time lmao. anyway enough on that, thank you so much for reading i hope you enjoyed, leave comment/kudos/just click on this fic to make me cry have a nice day/night/whatever and bye  
> [tumblr](https://adverbialstarlight.tumblr.com) [twitter](https://twitter.com/adverbialnouns)


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